Project Report
| May 10, 2024
"A", is for "Autonomous"
![The picture represents a girl close to Bahgah's ag]()
The picture represents a girl close to Bahgah's ag
Dear friends,
I’m proud to share with you a heartwarming story on the impact of the Valuable Girl Project on rekindling girls’ dreams and planting seeds of autonomy in their lives.
Bahgah is an 11-year-old girl growing up in a poor community that undermines the power of girls’ education. Her mother and female relatives have a basic level of education, and they can hardly read and write their names.
But Bahgah -meaning Joyousness in Arabic- had a different vision for herself. She wanted her voice to be heard, and for her hands to type on the computer. “I don’t want to be like my aunts, not educated and their family disrespects them. I want others to respect me, and to be helpful to my family. I feel I can do something different in my life.”
Bahgah is on her way to achieving her dream because she is enrolled in the Valuable Girl Project.
She heard about the Project from her friends at school. She asked her mother to go to the community development association, “CDA”, in her village to apply for her. At the beginning, the mother refused because she thought that it will cost her money to enroll Bahgah in the Valuable Girl classes. “What are you going to do with education? You will exit school soon” said the mother to Bahgah. But because of Bahgah’s “nagging,” the mother finally accepted to enroll her in the classes, and the good news was that the classes were free.
Bahgah was excited that someone would help her improve her education. In six months after being enrolled in the Valuable Girl Project, Bahgah practiced the correct methods of reading and writing the Alphabet, learned about her self-image, and received a proper care from her “Big Sister”. (The Big Sister is 20ish-year-old young woman in the Valuable Girl Project who was assigned to help Bahgah with her studying).
In a very small period of time, Bahgah showed remarkable improvement. She improved her grades at school, and she wrote her dreams in a paper entitled “I want to be a teacher”.
It doesn’t stop there. Bahgah started to read for her mother. “I help my mother with everything”, said Bahgah. She was confident to read street signs for her mother, help her with directions, and voice her opinion about how she and her mother should dress and present themselves. More importantly, Bahgah, now, speaks up what she wants and what she refuses decently.
Because of Bahga, “A” is not “apple” anymore; “A” is “autonomous”. This is what we aspire to achieve with every girl. They have the autonomy and strength to plan for their lives.
All this is because of your support to the Valuable Girl Project which helps us empower more girls like Bahgah.
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